介绍:
Meet the Incredible Jake Olson
After years of cheering for his favorite college football team, University of Southern California(USC) student Jake Olson has achieved his impossible dream. Despite being completely blind, he is now a part of the team, playing as a long snapper for the USC Trojans, approaching the game based on feel rather than sight.
Born with a cancer of the retina, Jake lost his left eye when he was only eight months old. “When doctors found my cancer, it was completely taking over my left eye,” said Jake. “The greatest fear is the cancer spreading through the optic nerve to the brain.” So the eye had to be removed entirely, followed by several rounds of treatment to prevent the cancer from spreading to the right eye. Sadly, it kept coming back. At the age of 12, Jake received news that he had to lose his right eye as well. He said, “Realizing that I was going to live a life without sight, it was difficult. I didn’t feel completely hopeless, but there was this sense of ‘I don’t know how I’m going to do anything anymore.’”
Being a lifelong Trojan fan, one of Jake’s last wishes before he lost his eye was to watch them play at Notre Dame and also to witness a practice session the night before the surgery.
Jake’s passion for the sport didn’t go unnoticed until former USC coach Pete Carroll reached out to the boy, inviting him to personally meet the players and spend more time with them. “Little did I know he had all these plans,” Jake recalled. “Introducing me to the team, having me sit on meetings, going to practice and eating dinner afterwards. And then after that, it just sped up into being a part of the team as an honorary member. Everything about it was just amazing and something that I will always be grateful for.”
Inspired by his interactions with the Trojans, when Jake got to high school, he started to think of ways he could be involved in his own school’s football team. At first, he didn’t think he could be of any real use, but then he heard of long snapping and it all started to fit.
Then Jake approached coach Chuck Peterson towards the end of the 2012 season, asking to join the team. The coach asked him to come back at the start of the next season, and Jake spent the extra time practicing hard. Eventually, he did become the starter on the team with his teammates guiding him on to the field and helping him line up the ball.
Having made it on his high school football team, it suddenly didn’t seem too impossible to do the same in college. And current USC coach Steve Sarkisian agreed, hinting to The LA Times in April 2015 that Jake indeed could make the cut. And in September, Jake’s lifelong dream came true.
“Going through adversity or challenges in life, it really does make you stronger,” said Jake. “Life is unfair, football is unfair, and sometimes things are unfair. But at the same time, it’s up to you how far you want to take yourself. It’s taught me not to give up. It’s taught me to keep fighting.”
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